Happy Birthday Carolyn! Today is the 71st birthday of one of the members of our crew. We got a bit of a late start and didn’t hit the water until 9:30. We paddled the last bay of Polly and started portaging. We ran into the same crew that we did yesterday (several times) and played “cat and mouse” across the 3 portages into Koma and Malberg. We stopped for lunch at the first site on Malberg. The site was extremely overgrown and looked like it hasn’t seen much use. After lunch we paddled Malberg and admired the site on the cliff on the narrows. We caught some wind on the way to the Kawishiwi River, but finally made the portage. The outfitter we worked with had made a note on our maps that this portage “might be muddy”... TALK ABOUT AN UNDERSTATEMENT! The middle of the portage was completely submerged by about two feet of water.

The River end was extremely muddy as well. We paddled the river and passed 4 open campsites-we were on a mission- we wanted the coveted 5-star site on Amber Lake. We pull into Amber and around the point...to see another canoe already there. Since it is late in the day and all four of us are tired and hungry, we back track to the site at the south end of the island-only it isn’t there! Our Fisher maps show it on the very end of the island, but it isn’t. It is 1/3 of the way up the west shore of the island (later, we found out that the McKensie maps have it marked correctly). Since it is late, we skip the brownies and ice cream planned for Carolyn’s birthday. I made chicken fettucini with mixed veggies and hot apple dessert for dinner, we got the dishes done, the bear bags up, and crawl into the tents for the night.  Kawishiwi River Campsite Review: Site 1969 This site is mis-marked on both this website and the Fisher maps. It is located about 1/3 of the way up the west side of the island. It has a decent canoe landing, a couple of iffy tent pads (rocks and logs...or as one member of our crew called them locks and rogs --- that would be the tired kicking in ). The fire area is VERY nice and has several large boulders that make great tables.

There is a rock face that goes right down to the water but is large enough and flat enough to make a great picnic area and to watch the sunset. We hung the bear bags down by the canoe landing. There are a couple of trails that split off down by the canoe landing that lead to different overlooks. Overall a 4- star site. Lakes: Polly, Koma, Malberg, Kawishiwi River, Amber, Kawishiwi River 7 mi paddle, 2 mi portage.